


Scenes from a mutual fascination

by luna65



Category: Hannibal (TV)
Genre: Implied Cannibalism, M/M, Murder Husbands, post-S3
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-09-12
Updated: 2015-09-12
Packaged: 2018-04-20 11:05:23
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,174
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4785026
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/luna65/pseuds/luna65
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Will is learning to define aspects of his new life.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Scenes from a mutual fascination

**Author's Note:**

> Included in the would-be canon of Hannibal and Will in South America. The tense shift mid-story is purposeful, my apologies for any fits I might cause in readers.

Every morning brought the light and the heat and the scent of flowers. The gentle pulse of music. The sky so perfectly shaded as the ceiling of the Divine was required to be. Will felt unreal in this light, all aspects so hypnotic as if he were continually on a drip of one of Hannibal's favorite psychotropic concoctions.

They enjoyed a rare breeze from the sea, coffee and fresh-baked bread with guava coulis. Will did not wonder what might be in the bread, it was warm and chewy with subtle hints of earth and the tang of the mother yeast. It was deliciously sustaining.

"I'm still getting used to the light here. It feels...heavy."

"The inevitability of change is not a burden today. I delight in seeing you here."

"With you."

"In a place you wouldn't have imagined yourself if not for me."

"You're the only one I _could_ imagine being with in this situation."

"Am I the only one you could imagine yourself with at all?"

" _Now_ you are."

Hannibal allowed himself a smirk and Will looked away, a feeling of penetration assailing him once more.

 

Hannibal's sense of humor insisted that Will act as his sous-chef and Will complied out of courtesy and to remind himself that _this life_ was the universe next door to the one he had been born to.

"Do you still want to eat me?" Will asked as he chopped vegetables and herbs. Hannibal was always in charge of the protein.

Hannibal's expression was seemingly blank, but all the years spent studying that face had taught Will the minute nuances to be seen.

"If I did, those meals would be for myself alone. I would not share you with the world."

"How would you kill me?" This inquiry was a shivery whisper, laden with barely repressed lurid curiosity.

"With my bare hands, of course. You deserve no less."

" _Intimate_. But wouldn't you be killing a part of yourself as well?"

"A part of me would die with you, but not by my hand. If I possessed the desire to finally slaughter you, it would be because you had slain the part of me which wanted you in the world."

"So consumption is **not** a natural progression."

"It is, for all things. But everything changes at the cellular level, every moment. Some situations reach the same conclusion despite their individual decay."

Will offered his own slight smile. He was beginning to see how fascinating a topic this was, the repercussions of entropy. How any detail might serve as the difference between devouring and being devoured.

 

A drop of water travels down his glass. Will places a finger beneath it, watches as it is absorbed into his skin. An entire universe now merged with his own dominion.

The environs of Recoleta grow subdued after two o'clock, the street in which they dwell is quiet but for those ambient sounds of distant life and commerce; this is a moneyed enclave, adhering to the traditional schedule of life below the Equator. But Will has yet to reset his circadian rhythms to this new languor. He sighs, closes his eyes, tries to allow the heat and the scent of frangipani to sedate him. It is everywhere in this area: in the gardens, clinging to the fortress-like walls of every residential compound, growing on the sides of the road among the other foliage providing privacy. Residents are paranoid here, their evident wealth providing a target of opportunity.

"Aren't you worried?" Will asked Hannibal when they first took ownership of their jewelbox palace. "We'll be rather tempting to those who covet what they assume we have."

"What we **do** possess, certainly. I welcome the intrusions of the rude, as you know I would."

"Their discourtesy is heavily-armed and well-planned."

"Surprise is what they consider their best weapon. I endeavor rarely to be surprised."

Will finishes his drink, rises, stretches, and peels away the linen and cotton adhering to his skin. A different stickiness than what he used to feel. Blood-warm evoked as encompassing atmosphere rather than specific sensation. He goes inside to where Hannibal is prone upon a chaise, eyes closed and hands folded. Will does not know if he actually sleeps. He studies the face in repose: scarred and yet still compellingly constructed, that particular set of bone and sinew which is likely now wholly unique, as the Lecter patrilineage has expired with the last of the line. Then, the maroon gaze regards him as if those eyes had not been closed a second prior.

"You are still unable to relax."

"No. I get...restless...this time of day."

"The absence of work, of society."

Will shrugs. "I suppose."

"Go to that place which will calm you. Close your eyes and cross the bridge. Walk slowly, appreciating every detail."

"Is this a guided meditation?" Will asks with a smirk.

"Of a sort. I cannot place you there, only open the door for you to step through."

 _As you always have_ , Will thinks.

 

There is a peculiar contemplative stillness to _this life_. They wandered throughout the city, memorizing all the places they desire to frequent. Hannibal shopped, as he loved to do, and Will observed the accumulation of his tastes. Their abode is not overly filled with objects, but those which enter are all harmoniously chosen and placed. Will experienced moments when he considered himself as just another accoutrement. The skin of the sensitive, the prized skull of an endangered creature.

Hannibal collects. Hannibal appreciates.

 

Every evening entered their milieu with deep orange fire and brilliant candlelight. It is the most romantic setting Will has ever experienced, the tableaux of each dinner and conversation. They watched the light fade and the colors change.

"What does love mean to you?" Will asked.

"It has many meanings. And only one." Hannibal replied.

"Your love for me, then."

"Are you familiar with the concept of _agape_?"

"Isn't it supposed to be the love of Christ?"

"It is older than Christianity. The highest form of love. Enduring affection which transcends time and all mortal bonds. When that theology was first attempting to define itself, the meaning was borrowed to describe the love of God for His creation."

"The benevolent father."

"The faithful shepherd. And what does love mean to you?"

"The only pure love I've ever known was for my dogs. With people, I don't know that I've ever known, exactly. Versions of love, perhaps, where I've pretended that I knew what it was, that I felt it instinctively."

"We learn by observing, and then by doing."

"Is that how you learned?"

"Love is a continual state, or the absence of it."

"And what about loving your enemy? Is that a form of _agape_ as well?"

Hannibal looked into his glass, breathing in the bouquet of the wine. "You tell me, Will."

 

Driven by that same lurid curiosity, Will later learned that the word also meant _feast_ , and therein lay the truth of Hannibal's definition: the hunger to consume that which will never satiate but will always satisfy.


End file.
